Module 4

Early Renaissance Painting: Fabriano, Masaccio, and Fra Angelico

- "Adoration of the Magi": Gentile da Fabriano is another artist working in the so-called "International Style" in Florence; same Gothic tracery patterns and visual splendor of the figures' costumes demonstrates a French influence. The iconography of the work is also influenced by French models, since the inclusion of chivalry (horsemanship) is a key characteristic of the French royal court; critical juncture is that it illustrates the first of number of innovations of the Italian Renaissance: foreshortening; continuation of the interest in naturalism witnessed with artists like Giotto in that the artist is using the idea of foreshortening, or adding depth through visual contraction of a figure, in depicting the horse; tempera on wood - "Tribute Money": fresco; Another artist working in Florence at this time was Masaccio, a master of Florentine fresco painting, who continued the earlier steps toward naturalism made by Giotto. Massacio will fully master two more major innovations of the Italian Renaissance: "single-point perspective" and "chiaroscuro" (depiction of light and shadow); its iconography revolves around an New Testament injunction to pay taxes which may have been a commentary on the "castato", the newly introduced Florentine income tax; figures dressed in classical drapery, which was influenced by models from Greek and Roman art; employs the technique of chiaroscuro, derived from the Italian word meaning "light-dark," an effect designed to create contrasts of light and dark tones (shadows) in this painting, which further highlights the three-dimensional form of the figure - "Masaccio's Expulsion of Adam and Eve": scene from the Book of Genesis in the bible; Note that their nude bodies are modeled after similar ideals of beauty from Greek and Roman art, where the canon of idealized proportions and human beauty was first established. Vasari, who was the first art historian, described Masaccio's style as "living, real, and natural. - "Massaccio's Holy Trinity": shows another critical development in Renaissance art: the use of accurate single-point perspective; perspective (three-dimensionality) is achieved through illusionistic architecture, such as the vault in which the figures of the Holy Trinity are contained. The architectural frame, featuring Ionic and Corinthian columns, also shows the influence of Greek and Roman architecture; The bottom portion of the fresco shows an illusionistic tomb with a skeleton, which functions as a memento mori, or "reminder of death," to the spectator - "Fra Angelico's Annunciation": Fra Angelico was a friar and painter at the San Marco Monastery in Florence. This Annunciation scene was inspired by an illustration from a 13th-century text on how to pray, called De modo orandi. It is a masterwork of illusionism, especially in the depiction of the loggia, the architectural space supported by arches and columns which shelter the figures; three-dimensional space is attained through a combination of perspective and chiaroscuro. Note that the figures are dressed in classical drapery, hearkening back to Greek and Roman sculpture.

High Renaissance Sculpture and Architecture

- "David": Michelangelo was foremost a sculptor. His David is the epitome of High Renaissance sculpture and a civic monument of Florence. Commissioned by the Cathedral Building Committee after the work on Florence Cathedral was completed, the figure was carved from a single, giant block of marble left over from the previous cathedral building campaign. The theme is almost identical with the previous bronze sculptures by Donatello and Verrocchio. The people of Florence strongly associated with David. He was a biblical and a civic hero for them. Michelangelo's statue was also understood as a political allegory, encouraging Florence and its people to be always watchful as enemies could be on the prowl - Pope Julius II, who had requested the Sistine Chapel ceiling, also commissioned Michelangelo to design his tomb in 1505. His original design called for a giant monument in the Vatican with 28 sculptures. However, the grandiose plan was quickly abandoned after the pope's premature death in 1513. Some of the sculptures were already finished, others not. - "Moses": An important figure for the incomplete tomb was Moses, depicted as massive and bearded elderly man, holding the Tablets of the Law. The figure features the same type of muscular body as in David or on the Sistine Chapel ceiling and is draped in classical garb - "Bound Slave": original tomb design comprised about 20 figures of so-called "slaves." These sculptures were left in various states of completion and the Bound slave from the Louvre is one of the few almost finished works. The visual appeal of the sculpture is the figure's struggle to free himself from bondage, highlighting again Michelangelo's interest in the study of anatomy and figures in action - Pope Julius II's most ambitious building program was the construction of a new St. Peter's Cathedral. The architect Bramante was hired to draft the plans. Bramante came up with plans that reflected the aesthetic preoccupations of the High Renaissance: symmetry, regularity, measure - which are embodied in the notion of the central plan. Bramante's plan is defined by the idea of nine interlocking crosses, covered by a large cupola. Only a small part of the plan was realized, and Michelangelo ended up simplifying Bramante's plan and building part of the facade of present-day St. Peter's. In anticipation of Bramante's structure, a medal was struck that shows the proportions of his New St. Peter's in relation to the Pantheon in Rome - "Tempietto": One structure that Bramante designed and actually built is the Tempietto. Tempiette means little temple. The architect drew inspiration from the round temples of Classical Antiquity (see Temple of Vestal Virgins). The underlying idea of the plan is two concentric circles, one for the columns and one for the inner sanctuary. Bramante fully realized that the most prefect and most perfectly symmetrical form is the circle. A round structure is a perfect example for a central plan, which epitomized the High Renaissance in architecture. The Tempietto today is part of the Spanish Academy in Rome - "Saint Peter's": Michelangelo finished his career as an architect. In 1546 Pope Paul III asked Michelangelo to complete the design and construction of New St. Peter's, after Bramante's project had been left behind incomplete. Michelangelo started by simplifying Bramante's central plan: he decided on a Greek cross plan with lateral chapels. For the façade, he opted for a rhythmical and highly ornate staccato of Corinthian pilasters. The aesthetics of the High Renaissance with their emphasis on measure and simplicity were abandoned. Stylistically, Michelangelo's façade of the Vatican marks the transition to Mannerist (late Renaissance) and Baroque (17th-century) architecture. The cupola was finished later by another architect named Giacomo della Porta and was not part of Michelangelo's design.

Flemish Baroque: Rubens and Van Dyck

- "Elevation of the Cross": most important artist in the Flemish, or southern Netherlandish tradition, is Peter Paul Rubens. As such, his art was influenced by Baroque art in Italy, to which he added his own hallmarks of heightened emotionalism, voluptuous bodies, and rose-colored flesh. Rubens had traveled to Italy and had studied the art of Michelangelo, Tintoretto and Caravaggio. Muscular bodies, chiaroscuro, and dramatic light effects dominate Rubens' art and that of his workshop. Most of the art known under Rubens' name was thus executed by his numerous and very talented workshop assistants. Rubens traveled a lot, as he tried to secure commissions for artworks to be executed by his workshop. In the process, he met many important people, such as the English king Charles I or members of the influential Medici family of Florence. His workshop was located in Antwerp, right on the divide between Flanders and Holland. - "Arrival of Maria de' Medici at Marseilles": Rubens received the largest commission of his life, consisting of 21 large canvases recounting the life of Maria de' Medici, wife of the French king and founder of the Bourbon royal line in France, Henry IV. The pictures were destined for the Luxemburg Palace in Paris, which housed one of very few publicly accessible art collections at the time. In this canvas we see Maria de' Medici's arrival in France by boat. Her marriage with Henry IV had been arranged for political reasons. An allegorical figure of France, with a blue mantle and embroidered fleur-de-lys welcomes her in the harbor of Marseilles. The ship is richly ornamented and shows the coat of arms of the Medici. The captain of the ship sports the cross of the Order of Malta. At the bottom, we find mythological figures, Neptune and the Nereids, frolicking in the water. This is just one part of the series. Other canvases depict how Henry IV was assassinated by a religious fanatic, how Maria de' Medici was crowned Queen of France, how she had a fallout with her son, the future Louis XIII, and how she and her son reconciled - "Charles I Dismounted": Most of the assistants who trained and worked in Rubens' studios remain anonymous. An exception was Anthony van Dyck. He started out as one of Rubens' assistants, built an artistic reputation of his own, worked in Genoa, Italy, and became a court artist to the British king Charles I. His specialty was portrait painting, and he pioneered the formula of the full-length portrait seen here, which became popular with monarchs and the aristocracy across Europe. The British king is depicted very modestly, in the pose of the landed gentry and in hunting attire. Hunting was the privilege of aristocracy. His pose is self-assertive, but he is not holding a scepter and does not wear a crown. The river in the background is the Thames

The Age of Baroque in Italy

- Baroque style happened mostly during the 17th century, but its influence also extends to the 18th century. It is derived from the Portuguese word barocco, meaning an irregularly shaped pearl. It was initially a pejorative term, implying inferiority with respect to the culture of the High Renaissance; such value judgements are no longer implied by the term today. The Baroque put an emphasis on convoluted forms, such as spiral columns, heightened emotionalism, intense religiosity, theatricality, rapture, irrationality, and over-decoration. The style is associated above all with Catholicism and its struggle over a leadership position in Europe. The Baroque style coincides historical with a long series of religious wars, and especially the Thirty Years War, 1618-1648. Its approach to art and architecture was defined theoretically by the Council of Trent, 1545-1563, charged with deliberating on countermeasures against Protestantism, which emphasized the use the rhetorical and propaganda qualities of art to convince believers of the virtues of Catholicism. Naturally, the first place where the Baroque style found application was the Vatican - Bernini was a sculptor and an architect, who defined the Baroque style in Rome. In the center of the Vatican, he created a giant bronze canopy, about 100 feet high, which marks the spot where St. Peter is buried. - "Baldacchino": is defined by four spiral columns made of bronze with gilding. Some of the bronze was obtained from melting down pre-Christian bronze ornaments from the Pantheon, an act which was not appreciated by the Roman population, even though it was mostly symbolic. Everything about the Baldacchino is over-decorated, including the vines and bees incrusted on the columns, which refer symbolically to the Barberini family. The Baldacchino is an excellent example of the theatricality inherent in Baroque art: the viewer's glance is drawn from the canopy to the Cathedra Petri (St. Peter's symbolic throne) in the background, which is dramatically illuminated from the back. - "Ecstasy of St. Teresa": Bernini was also a singularly gifted sculptor in marble, which he infused with emotionalism and drama like no other. St. Teresa, a mystical saint of the Carmelite order from the Spanish Counter-Reformation, is depicted in this sculpture group of a church in Rome in the state of religious ecstasy. Its place is in a niche of colored marble, gold, and various architectural decorations. It is a typical work for the Counter-Reformation/Baroque in that it stresses belief, devotion, and piety over reason (reason was the guiding idea when Martin Luther translated the bible, for instance, and the authority of reason was often claimed by Protestants). - "Conversion of Saint Paul": Bernini defined Baroque sculpture, Caravaggio defined Baroque painting. In this scene, he painted the conversation of the Pharisee Saul to St. Paul. Like Bernini, Caravaggio, loved to use indirect light sources, situated in his case in night settings, which allowed him to introduce dramatic highlights on the figures. The implication is that a supernatural event is about to take place. The term for night scenes with strong contrasts and indirect light outside of the picture frame is "tenebrism" (from Italian tenebroso=shadowy manner). It can be associated with Caravaggio and Baroque art - "Narcissus": Most of Caravaggio's art is biblical in inspiration. Narcissus, who falls in love with his own reflection on water, is an exception, because it is based on a classical source, Ovid's Metamorphoses. Later on, Narcissus will die of excessive self-love. Caravaggio's great strength was to depict real, everyday people. Narcissus is a timeless theme, relevant as ever in today's age of social media; he is personified by an everyday young man whom we could imagine seeing on today's streets - "Calling of Saint Matthew": Caravaggio's Calling of St. Matthew, we witness another conversion scene: Christ is entering the house of Levi, a Roman tax collector, and informs him that he (the tax collector) will follow him and his disciples. Stricken by surprise, the tax collector will indeed follow his calling and become St. Matthew. In a typical manner for Caravaggio, he is hiding Christ's face half in shadow and puts the light source outside of the picture. Thus, it is another example of a tenebrist picture. There is but a small hint of a trace of a halo above Christ's face so as not disrupt the impression of this being a real-life scene. Caravaggio was a master of psychological renderings (evident in the element of surprise) and the rendering of everyday people. Caravaggio's art had a tremendous impact on contemporary painters in the 17th century, many of whom imitated him. - "Flight into Egypt": Italian art scene was very much defined by regional differences. Bologna, in the center of northern Italian, created its own group of masters. Central to the local art scene was the Carracci family, which founded a local art academy, or art school. Art academies started in Rome during the age of Michelangelo, but they functioned initially more as local art clubs. In Bologna, art training became part of the mission, but it did not have the strict formalism that the French Academy of Painting and Sculpture would impose on artists after its foundation in 1648. For the next three hundred years, the Parisian academy would set the agenda for artistic quality. In the image below, we see a "lunette" (semi-circular) painting of the Flight into Egypt by Annibale Carracci. The figure group with the holy family in the foreground seems secondary compared to the landscape in the background. The landscape is idealized and a typical example of an "Italian" or classical landscape, that is a cultured nature setting with evidence of human intervention (roads, passages, towns, ruins, etc.) and Mediterranean flora (cypress, pine, and olive trees, etc.). This landscape type is different from the "rugged" landscapes of northern European art and, later on, America - "Loves of the Gods": best known and largest work by Annibale Carracci is undoubtedly the Loves of the Gods in the Palazzo Farnese, Rome. The Farnese family was one of the leading families in Rome; the Franese Cardinal Odoardo Farnese, a relative of Pope Paul III, commissioned this fresco ceiling from Annibale Carracci. The Palazzo today serves as the French embassy in Rome; ceiling is barrel-vaulted and curving, which added another degree of difficulty to the project. Carracci painted the illusion of a collection of framed pictures, one hung next to each other, on the ceiling. Art collections of this time indeed featured such a hanging. Carracci was obviously influenced by Michelangelo and the Sistine Chapel ceiling. This is evident, in particular, in the depiction of the muscular youths on the lower ledge. This is a typical example of a Baroque illusionistic ceiling painting: the picture gallery is just a figment of the viewer's imagination

Early Renaissance Architecture

- Painter Giotto di Bondone designed Campanile (bell tower) of the Florence Cathedral in 1334. However, the largest challenge, the large dome to cover the crossing, remained unresolved - This problem remained unresolved until sculptor and architect Brunelleschi took over the project. - Due to its sheer size and weight, building the dome crossing was impossible to accomplish by (traditional) wooden centering and buttressing handed down from the Middle Ages (see previous Module on medieval cathedrals). The people of Florence wanted to have a large dome space rather than a high spire (as was customary in Germany and France). Brunelleschi's solution to this problem was to build a dome composed of ogival (pointed arch) sections with ribs for internal reinforcement, and a thin, double shell for reducing the pressure on the dome's base. There is also a compression ring inserted on the dome's base. This was the first time ever that such a solution was attempted. The fact that Brunelleschi's design plan succeeded send out a strong political signal of Florence's preeminence in Renaissance Italy - In Florence, there was an extraordinary concentration of wealth and political power with the Medici family, especially under Cosimo de'Medici. However, the family was ousted from power and fled Florence in 1430s, during Girolama Savonarola's campaign of religious fundamentalism. The family returned to Florence in 1434 and needed to complete the construction of a palace they had begun to design, but they were now wary of overly ostentatious displays of wealth that may attract the same negative attention that had forced them to flee. - "Palazzo Medici-Riccardi": there was a change of architect and design plan for the Medici palace in the aftermath of expulsion. Architect Michelozzo di Bartolommeo took over the project. He settled on a solution that was a hybrid structure which combined elements of both a palace and a fortress. The façade was heavily rusticated (using roughly hewn stone), giving it a fortress-like appearance on the ground floor. Rusticated masonry was originally a Roman Invention, used for military architecture. Again, we see that the Renaissance had a predilection for ancient Rome - even when it came to such practical matters. - key to understanding classical architecture is the three orders: Doric, Ionic and Corinthian. The orders are defined by the capitals of the columns. The Doric order was typical for original, native Greek temple architectures from a time when temples were still wooden structures. The Doric capital is simple and unadorned. Above it, on the pediment of the temple, one finds a hint at the original wooden beams of the Doric temples, reduced to building blocks with striated decorations (so-called triglyphs). The Ionic order was introduced to Greece with increasing contacts and expansion to Asia Minor, today' s Turkey. While the triglyphs have disappeared in the Ionic order, the capitals have a scroll decoration. The Corinthian order, finally, is even more ornate, with stylized Acanthus leaves defining the capitals. - Alberti was arguably the most important architect of the early Renaissance. He was not only a designer and builder, but also a translator and commentator on Vitruvius' Roman theoretical texts on architecture. He was fascinated by mathematics to find ideal and symmetric design solutions. He believed that Vitruvius' thought was based on mathematical models. - "church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence": was designed and completed in the 13th century, but Alberti was commissioned to design the façade in 1458. In his design, we get a sense for his obsession with symmetry and mathematics. The marble pattern on the façade is completely symmetrical and achieves a sense of rhythm through the repetition of geometric elements and stark black-and-white contrasts. The structure was completely designed according to mathematical ratios, such as 1:1, 2:1, 1:3, 2:3, to create symmetry. Another innovative feature of the façade are the lateral scrolls, which flank the upper portion with the rose window. The marble revetment, typical of Tuscan architecture, echoes Renaissance interests in symmetry, rhythm, and mathematics - another one of Alberti's façade designs, we see a structure rife with Roman architectural references, showing his appreciation of Greek and Roman building. In the West Façade of the church of Sant'Andrea in Mantua, we see a temple-like elevation merged with a triumphal arch. The façade, much like Santa Maria Novella, is rigidly symmetrical, and utilizes mathematical ratios as design principles - Whether in painting, sculpture or architecture, we find similar aesthetic denominators for the early Renaissance: symmetry, rhythm, rationality, mastery of space, focus of the human form and proportions, and an interest in reviving the accomplishment of ancient Greece and Rome and putting them to work in the contemporary world

The Renaissance in Northern Europe

- Renaissance had its natural point of origin in Italy because the perpetual presence of the classical past in Italian cities, evident, for instance, in the ruins in Rome. Another contributing circumstance was Italy's large budget surplus from international trade, which enabled extensive investments in art and architecture. However, there is also a parallel development in northern Europe, which, to distinguish it from the events in Italy, we call the "Northern Renaissance." - Northern Renaissance took place mostly in the regions of Flanders and Burgundy, which correspond roughly to today's northern Belgium (Flanders) and the Burgundy region in France, best known for its red wine. Together, they formed a political entity known as the Dutchy of Burgundy, which was ruled in 15th century by Philip the Good (1396-1467), who made a name for himself as an art lover and patron. - the 15th century, Burgundy and Flanders experienced great economic prosperity through trade, especially the wool trade with Italy (produced in Italy, wool was exported north and distributed through Burgundy). As northern Europe finally emerged from the Middle Ages, more major cities developed and with them emerged a mercantile class equipped the money to afford small works of art. The 15th century also saw the invention of the stock exchange in Flanders, called the "Bourse", and the first use of credit instruments, such as letters of credit or certificates of deposit (the remote ancestors of modern-day credit cards); Unlike in Italy, there was no tradition of classical art or the influence of humanism in Burgundy, Flanders, German-speaking countries. Therefore, the art of the Northern Renaissance is distinctly different from that of the Italian Renaissance. Northern Renaissance art was characterized by the following: -interest in devotional images (small religious paintings to be displayed and used for prayer within a private home instead of a church) - lingering Medieval pre-occupation with sin, damnation, and redemption - moralizing themes, either showing how to live a righteous life or condemning a sinful life by showing viewers what not to do - Jan van Eyck is an artist of central importance to the Northern Renaissance. He was active in the Flemish city of Ghent and is traditionally credited with the invention of oil paints (oil glazes), applied to panels (and not yet canvas). This work by van Eyck is a monumental altarpiece designed for the cathedral of his home city of Ghent. It is a polyptych, or an altarpiece with multiple wings, or hinged panels. Altarpieces serve as backdrops for mass; they were opened for religious ceremonies and on feast days but remained closed on regular days - The Ghent Altarpiece was paid for by the Burgomeister (mayor) of Ghent, Jodocus Vijd, and his wife, Isabel Borlutt. The couple is depicted in a kneeling pose on the lower left and right panels of the altarpiece; spiky elements in the curving frames of these figures are called tracery patterns, which are often found in medieval art and architecture (see Gothic cathedrals, discussed previously). As is typical for the Northern Renaissance, biblical scenes are recreated in the context of local, contemporary culture. Thus, in the background of the Annunciation scene, we see a view through the windows that captures the city of Ghent how it would have looked in the 15th century. - "Ghent Altarpiece": view of the opened altarpiece places an even greater emphasis on visual splendor; Northern Renaissance art put a lot of emphasis on the symbolic meaning in art, such as seen in this example; is monumental, public, religious art; private side to the artist, expressed in smaller-scale portraits - "Man in a Red Turban": s believed to be the first self-portrait painted by an artist since Classical Antiquity - that is in the more than one thousand years preceding van Eyck. We believe that the work is a self-portrait because of the inscription on the frame (preserved in its original form), which reads, in fake Greek letters, "As I can." The red turban adds an extravagant touch to van Eyck's personality; represents a visual milestone in expressing a self-aware, self-affirming modern consciousness through mirrors and self-portraits - "Giovanni Arnolfini and His Bride": Although the picture is an example of private art, the iconography has strong religious overtones. The dog represents fidelity; the mirror reflecting a single lit candle alludes to God's all-seeing eye (a symbol also featured on the back of the $1 bill); the medallions surrounding the mirror illustrate scenes from the Passion of Christ; the wooden shoes were traditional Flemish wedding gifts from the husband; The Arnolfini Wedding, as this panel is also known, has also a "sociological dimension": it reveals the rise of the middle-class as early as in the 15th century; it describes the material culture of the middle-class (the interior depicted here is typical for members of the Flemish middle-class); it attests to the creation of wealth through mercantile exchange and the expansion of international trade networks; it shows how the social identity of burghers was being constructed - "Deposition": Rogier van der Weyden's Deposition is a triptych, which differs from a polyptych in that it is a two-winged altarpiece. Finished around 1435, it is one of the first oil paintings in the history of art, created with oil glazes on wood, which yield the same brilliant colors; space is crammed as the figures shown must bow to fit into the "box." As in Van Eyck, there is an emphasis on the richness of cloth, which is another hallmark of Flemish painting - "Portinari Altarpiece": represents a unique case of a Flemish artist being commissioned by an Italian patron, Tommaso Portinari, who was Medici agent and ship owner. Portinari asked van der Goes to create an altarpiece for the Portinari family chapel in Florence; is the figure type (large, bearded figures) and the manner in which the landscape is depicted (medieval architecture, green vegetation), which are typically associated with northern European. The work created a sensation among Italian artists and viewers, who were completely unfamiliar with these northern conventions - "Mérode Altarpiece": triptych by Robert Campin is a small-scale altarpiece, created for a private home (not a church or a cathedral). It demonstrates an increasing emphasis on private prayer and devotion over the course of the century leading up to the Reformation. (The Protestant Reformation will only begin in about 1517); left panel shows Patron Peter Inghelbrecht and his wife in adoration in a hortus conclusus (Latin for closed garden) and describes the middle-class status of the sitters. The central panel shows again the Annunciation, but the setting is a room typical for a middle-class, Flemish home, complete with a beamed ceiling, tiles, and a large chimney piece. Finally, the right panel shows Christ's father Joseph, a carpenter, who is making mousetraps. This occupation is an allegory for Joseph trapping the devil. All the details of Joseph's workshop are rendered very realistically, including the carpentry tools. In the background of the right panel, there is yet another vista of a typical Flemish Renaissance town; Campin, too, situated the biblical stories in the time and place when he and his audience lived - "Garden of Earthly Delights": one of the very first works of fantastic art ever created. It follows the triptych format and depicts (in the opened form) life as a carnal orgy; however, the "earthly delights" in question are depicted with deeply moralizing overtones. The triptych was not created for a church, convent or cathedral, and whether it is a religious work of art is a debatable question. In the closed version, the exterior panels depict earth as a disc, which corresponds to the official scientific teachings of the day, including those of the Church. Scientists like Galileo Galilee would challenge such notions a few decades hence. The Garden - wholly a product of Bosch's imagination - is a circus of carnal desires and insinuates associations of nudity with sin. The fountain-like structures in the background are imitating alchemical apparatuses, which reference a question which consumed alchemists at the time: the ability to transmute base materials into gold. Alchemy is a pseudo-science, but one which would eventually evolve into modern chemistry. The side panels illustrate visions of Heaven and Hell, with Hell featuring exquisite tortures and often hermetic (mysterious, difficult to interpret) imagery, including humans being tortured with musical instruments. Not much is known about the context of the work. It was commissioned for the residence of Henry III of Nassau, Regent of the Netherlands - a worldly ruler. The intentions behind the work - satire, eroticism, or a moral warning? - remain as enigmatic as the content itself.

Early Renaissance Sculpture

- Wool Merchant's Guild of Florence sponsored a competition which was held to find a sculptor for the east doors of Florence baptistery, a building separate but adjacent to the cathedral of Florence. The submissions by two finalists, Brunelleschi and Ghiberti, survive and reveal some of the characteristics of the Renaissance style in sculpture. - artists had to work with certain constraints: the scenes, conceived as samples, had to depict the "Sacrifice of Isaac" and had to fit into a quatrefoil (cloverleaf) pattern; both scene are thus inserted into a French Gothic quatrefoil frame — a traditional design pattern popular during the Medieval period. However, each of the two artists' submissions appealed to different underlying aesthetic principles: Brunelleschi's was more conservative, devoid of experiments, and maybe touched by the Gothic style, while Ghiberti employs drama, and shows a profound understanding of the classical canon of the male nude figure; the muscularity and anatomy of body was inspired by Greek and Roman sculpture. The composition is also more three-dimensional, animated, and wind-swept. There is a greater sense of drama. The reference to the canon of classical beauty in the art of antiquity, as expressed by Ghiberti, won him the competition. The early Renaissance culture of humanism favored his approach over Brunelleschi's more traditional style, but Brunelleschi turned to architecture and built the dome of Florence cathedral, which ultimately won him greater fame - early 14th-century building contained niches for statuary to be filled by guilds, and the sculptor Nanni di Banco was given the commission to fill the niches of the sculptures' guild. - "Four Crowned Saints": represent Christian sculptors who lived at the time of Emperor Diocletian in ancient Rome; classical, free-standing figures; they are not engaged with the wall, as was the tradition with medieval sculptures, which were a part of church/cathedral architecture. Medieval sculpture was summary and not individualized. We again see the use of classical drapery, proportions, and unique physiognomy to highlight individualism which the Renaissance appreciated. The Four Crowned Saints also functioned as advertisement for the sculptors' guild. On an everyday basis, many sculptors produced tomb sculptures to make a living. - Another sculpture for the niches of the Or San Michele was created by Donatello. Financed by the guild of linen drapers, his statue of "St. Mark" was the first completely free-standing sculpture on a building since Classical Antiquity. The figure also bends its knee in a "contrapposto" (weightshift) pose, which many Greek and Roman statues feature. The flexed knee gives it a more life-like appearance. An example from the classical world would be the Kritios Boy,490-480 B.C., found on the Acropolis in Athens. However, Donatello's most famous work was yet to be commissioned by the Medici family. - "Donatello's David": represented an even more important landmark in Renaissance art because it was the first free-standing classical nude figure since Antiquity; classical nude could not be represented because of connotations with the pagan (pre-Christian) tradition and the association of the nude body with sinfulness. However, Donatello revived the nude as a subject, reinvigorating the classical canon of proportions and the classical convention of contrapposto. The choice to depict David, the Biblical slayer of Goliath, was intentional, as the David story was symbolic for the independence of the republic of Florence - "Verrocchio's David": second Medici commission of the same subject was completed by the sculptor Verrocchio, who took a different approach to the iconography. Verrocchio's David is not a classically inspired nude, although the contours of the hero's body are clearly visible. The most remarkable difference between the two Davids is the contrast in the artists' choices for portraying of the inner psychological disposition of David: Donatello's David is introspective, quiet, classical, and looks at Goliath's head while Verrocchio's David is brash, confident, self-assertive, and his gaze is directed to the spectator; he is also more mature in age

France in the 17th Century

- country of great importance for the culture of the 17th century was France. In the next module, we will be talking a lot more about the effort involved with Louis XIV's building of the palace at Versailles. For now, we will focus on painting in 17th-century France. Louis XIV, the "Sun King," ruled from 1643 until his death in 1715. Under his leadership France rose to become the leading power in Europe (economy, military, culture). French took the place of Latin as the leading international language (the role which English holds today). Nevertheless, freedom and tolerance were limited. The Protestant minority, the Huguenots, were persecuted under the Sun King's rule. - "Et in Arcadia Ego": Arguably, the history of painting in France begins with Nicolas Poussin. Poussin established the dominance of classical mythology and classical history in French painting for the next 300 years. His classicism will become the dogma of academic training in art, especially in France, until end of 19th century. Born in Normandy, Poussin lived most of his life in self-imposed exile in Rome. He scorned the Parisian art world and returned to Paris only at the end of this life. This choice made Poussin the quintessential history painter and a role model for the French Academy of Painting and Sculpture, founded in 1648. Poussin's art is also at the root of the hierarchy of genres, which puts history painting (scenes from Greek and Roman history or mythology) at the top of prestige; still lifes, genre (lowlife) scenes, portrait painting, etc. are at the lower end of the hierarchy of genres. In part thanks to Poussin, history painting will become the gold standard of art training and academic art. Et in Arcadia Ego is a typical example. The setting is an Arcadian landscape, named after a paradise-like place in ancient Greece, Arcadia. We find a group of shepherds in the foreground who study the inscription on a sarcophagus that reads (in translation from Latin): "I, too, was once in Arcadia." - "Embarkation of the Queen of Sheba": Poussin was the master of painting classical stories, which put him ahead of his contemporary Claude Lorrain, who specialized in pseudo-classical landscapes and port scenes. His landscapes stand in the Italianate tradition and often take place in and around Rome. Claude (as he was called) was most appreciated for his renderings of all-suffusing, golden sun light and his harbor scenes, such as in this example. In reality, the neoclassical architecture depicted here is similar to that of eighteenth-century French port cities, such as Bordeaux. - "Family of Country People": Le Nain represents an iconographic tradition completely different from that of Poussin or Claude. He and his two brothers painted subjects related to Netherlandish genre of lowlife paintings. They were interested in peasants and country folk. In fact, Le Nain's work was often taken even by his French contemporaries to be the work of a Dutch or Flemish artist. The Family of Country People was painted during the final phase of the Thirty Years' War, yet it effectively covers up the real hardships, famines, and destruction in the countryside at this time. The peasants have enough to eat, they live with dignity, even enjoy music, and are subservient. In real life, there were peasant uprisings and marauding armies ravaging farms around this time. The brownish tonalities underscore the genre aspect of the scene

Protestant Reformation in Germany and the Netherlands

- development of art and architecture in northern Europe, especially in the Netherlands and Germany, was deeply affected by the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But even in Catholic countries, like Italy and Spain, the reaction against the Protestant Reformation left its mark in the form of the Baroque style. We can associate therefore the art and architecture of the Baroque period, that is the seventeenth century, with the so-called Counter-Reformation. In what follows, we will be looking at this evolution from the perspective of painting, sculpture, and architecture - One of the triggers of the Protestant Reformation was the sale of so-called indulgences to a deeply devout population. Indulgences were pieces of paper granting exemption from time in purgatory in return for a fee paid in cash. Such papers had been in circulation for some time. They were privately printed and offered forgiveness for sins against prayer. Now the Vatican and its agents began selling them to raise money for Pope Julius II. Julius II had financial problems because of warfare; but he was also deeply invested in beautifying the Vatican, which required money. Martin Luther was a clergyman in a provincial part of eastern Germany. He objected strongly to the sale of indulgences, considering the practice corrupt. In 1517, he nailed 95 theses (complaints) to the church door of his hometown in Wittenberg. This started the Protestant movement and the eventual split of the Catholic Church. From a religious point of view, Protestantism stresses personal accountability to God, the punitive consequences of sin, and rejects the intercession of saints. Protestant church interiors, in comparison to those of Catholicism, tend to be sparse and do not have much of a decoration or artworks. The emphasis is on the word, written and spoken, or music, but not on visual representation. A lot of artworks and convents were destroyed during the Reformation. The bible was upheld as the sole authority on spiritual matters. The Catholic Church launched a counter-offensive to constrain the spread of Protestantism. Among many other measures, the Catholic Council of Trent, in Italy, prescribed that Catholic Churches were supposed to have splendid artworks and decorations to overwhelm a mostly illiterate population with visual rhetoric. This gave rise to the art of the Counter-Reformation and to the Baroque style. - German-speaking countries were at the center of Protestantism. Germany as a country did not exist in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; instead, there was a patchwork pattern of small, independent principalities, which had their own leaders, some of whom converted to Protestantism. The Netherlands represented a case apart. There was a strong following of Protestantism in the north of the country (today's Holland), while the south (part of today's Belgium) remained Catholic. - Albrecht Dürer was Germany's leading artist from the age of the Reformation. His father was a goldsmith in Nuremberg, a city which was best known for its publishing industry. Dürer's family had ties to both the art scene and the publishing industry; his godfather was a painter named Wolgemut, who became his first art teacher. Dürer was the first northern artist to fully understand and apply to innovations of the Italian Renaissance, such as perspective or correct human anatomy. - "Albrecht Dürer, Self-Portrait": Dürer's self-portrait from 1500, when he turned 29. It was an audacious act to portray himself in this frontal pose, as it was reserved for representations of Christ. His hand gesture mimics Christ's act of blessing - "Knight, Death, and the Devil": knight in the center defies Death (figure in the back, with hourglass) and the Devil (daemon, or fantasy creature). The dog is his companion (fidelity); the lizard stands for sin. Dürer may have wanted to pay tribute to Emperor Maximilian, the "Christian Knight" of the Holy Roman Empire of German Nation to which Franconia belonged; An alternative and more intriguing reading is that, for the soldier, Death and the Devil are not antagonists, but the attributes of his profession, as he defies death and the devil alike - "Four Apostles": Many artists painted the Apostles, but what made Dürer's version different is the context. These two panels were completed shortly after the beginning of the Reformation and at the artist's own expense. The artist presented them to the city fathers of Nuremberg, who put them in the city hall, not a in church. Dürer also pushed St. Peter, holding the keys to Peter's or the Vatican, in the background, and foregrounded St. John, who was associated with the Gospels. The context of the Reformation is therefore expressed in very subtle ways. - "Money-Changer and His Wife": Quinten Massys' Money-Changer and His Wife was completed before the Protestant Reformation but alludes to some of the ethical issues that it carried. Massys was active in Antwerp, located in today's Belgium, but in the 16th century was part of the southern Netherlands. Antwerp was a major center of global trade and commerce at the time; Money existed only in the form of coin, and the content of precious metal (and hence value) could vary a great deal from one coin to another. Thus coins were weighed with a scale to determine their true intrinsic value. The painting also makes the point that these worldly and commercial concerns need to be balanced with spiritual and religious concern; notion of balance was important to medieval and Renaissance economic thought: worldly concerns (accumulation of riches) needed to be balanced with worldly riches (the accumulation of riches in the beyond) - "Hunters in the Snow": One aspect that sets Netherlandish art apart from that of Italy is the interest in low life or genre scenes. Pieter Brueghel the Elder is a good example. The term genre, in an art context, means everyday scenes from the lives of commoners. Brueghel loved to depict peasants, village life, the countryside and uncouth behavior. Still, his villages look like out of a fairy tale. In this example, it is wintertime in Flanders. Villagers are ice skating in the background; in the foreground a group of villagers, who were out hunting, return to their families with their dogs. It is an everyday and unpretentious scene - "

Painting in Venice: Bellini, Giorgione, and Titian

- the focus of the High Renaissance has been mostly on Rome, Florence, and Milan. The story of the High Renaissance in Venice followed a slightly different pattern. Let us first look briefly at the political, economic, and cultural history of the city of Venice itself. Since the early Middle Ages, Venice was an independent city state famous for its canals - Venice is located in a lagoon in northern Italy; The lagoon was first settled during the Migration period of the Middle Ages, when the native population on the nearby land sought refuge in the swamps from the incursions of such marauding people as the Goths. Venice has therefore no classical past - By the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, the city had become exceedingly wealthy thanks to matching demand in northern Europe with trade across the Middle and Far East, which, because of the silk road, reached as far as China. The Venetian Republic's system of government was an oligarchy, where a few wealthy families elected from their midst a doge (the head of government). The doge's position rotated among the leading patriarchal families whose names were inscribed in the so-called Golden Book of the city. Venetian society was much concerned with art and architecture. Considerable expenditure for art and buildings, such as churches and monuments, was considered a civic duty for the patrician upper-class. Aesthetically, much emphasis was placed on color, airiness, and decorative qualities. We can associate Venetian painting with color and much less with intellectual pursuits - Venice was at the height of its power and prosperity, but the discovery of America initiated a long period of decline. The Mediterranean was the center of world commercial activity until 15th and 16th century, but the center of trade then shifted into the Atlantic Ocean. Other countries, such as Spain, Portugal, and England, were in much better strategic position. Although Venice's political influence in the world dwindled and even its foothold on the Mediterranean decreased with the Ottoman Empire's wresting away the Venetian trading posts and harbors, the Venetian Republic still stood its ground until it was toppled in 1798 by Napoleon Bonaparte - "San Zaccaria Altarpiece": Giovanni Bellini defined the Venetian style of the Cinquecento, which consisted of splendid colors and serenity of composition; figures are framed by an apse with a (painted) mosaic and Roman pilasters in the Corinthian order. This type of group is called a Sacra coversazione, or a fictional conversation of saints and biblical figures assembled from across the ages and from different locations. Note the bright blue of the Virgin's drapery and the fiery red of St. Jerome's tunic - this is what is meant when we say that Venetian art of the High Renaissance is about color - "Pastoral Symphony": Renaissance is as much about secular art as it is about religious art. The Pastoral Symphony is sometimes attributed to Titian, but most modern authors agree that it is by Giorgione; has connotations with music-making and poetry. The scene shows two young men playing a lute; one is wearing a fanciful satin dress in bright red (Venetian color again!); pastoral activity is associated with shepherding; The subject of carefree parties of men and women, often in luxurious dress, enjoying themselves in a park-like setting was picked up again in 18th-century Rococo art, in the form of fête champêtre (see Module 5); in the 19th century, Edouard Manet was inspired by the Pastoral Symphony to paint Luncheon in the Grass (see Module 6), which caused a major art world scandal in 1863, as Manet had updated the scene and turned the young musicians into contemporary college students accompanied by their scantily dressed female friends in a forest clearing - "Madonna of the Pesaro Family": by Venetian Renaissance artist Titian brings together religious and civic virtues. In the center is St. Peter, while to the lower-left the viewer sees the Donor Jacopo Pesaro, commander of the papal fleet during the Venetian-Turkish war in the Mediterranean. The elongated pair of columns anticipates Mannerist art of later years. Titian emphasized the surface, texture, and color of the work, but not so much the content or the design - "Meeting of Bacchus and Ariadne": The sound of cymbals accompanies the intruders. Titian conceived a tumultuous event full of references to classical art, which evades simple explanations, as the ambiguity of Titian's sources, the uncertainties about the event depicted and the artist's ambivalent intentions are part of the work's appeal - "Venus of Urbino": was another private commission for an Italian princely court, that of Guidobaldo II, Duke of Urbino. Its enigmatic iconography shows a courtesan (kept woman) in her bedchamber as two servants in the back search a chest for a dress. Presumably it is a morning scene and the subject is about to get dressed. The identity of the sitter is unknown. The work established conventions for portraits of reclining female nudes until the end of 19th century with an emphasis on sensuality and the ambiguity of the scene. The setting is that of a Renaissance palazzo; palazzi (pl. of palazzo) were typically sparsely furnished, except for chests

High Renaissance in Italy

- the Italian Renaissance largely defines our understanding of what art is. The Renaissance in Italy took place between the 15th and 16th centuries. It was an age of technical innovations in art, great scientific discoveries, and a revival of the know-how lost after the end of antiquity. Arts and sciences were not seen as separate entities but formed a unity. One can divide the Renaissance into four distinct periods: the proto-Renaissance (13th and 14th centuries), the early Renaissance (15th century), the high Renaissance (early 16th century), and the late Renaissance (also known as Mannerism ca. 1520-1600). The High Renaissance was a period marked by some of the most outstanding artistic talent in history, when Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael lived - "Uomo universale, or Universal Man": idea of the Uomo universale, or Universal Man, also developed during the Renaissance. This ideal is epitomized by Leonardo da Vinci and his drawing of the Vitruvian Man: Leonardo was an engineer, a natural scientist and a painter. Human experience is placed at the center of the universe, literally and philosophically. Artistic and scientific pursuits are one. The Uomo universale, or Universal Man is a polymath

The Age of Baroque in Flanders and the Netherlands

- we defined the Baroque style as a phenomenon of the 17th century, which was driven by the struggle between Catholicism and the Counter-Reformation. There is yet another trend in 17th-century art, which developed along slightly different lines, although the general historical context is the same. This trend evolved in the Netherlands during the 17th century. The northern part of the Netherlands (today's Holland) turned Protestant early on and the southern part (Flanders, or the northern part of today's Belgium) remained Catholic. Note that the adjective for anything (including art) from the region of Flanders is "Flemish." Hence, Flemish painting is painting from the southern Netherlands, today's Belgium. - Each of the two regions developed their own distinct artistic identity and produced outstanding artistic talent. Art in the Catholic southern Netherlands was closely aligned with Baroque art in Italy and Spain, as seen, for instance, in the paintings of Peter Paul Rubens, active in Antwerp. Art in the Protestant north mostly rejected images of saints and religious subject matter; instead, art turned secular, became smaller in format, and was privately owned. The rudimentary beginnings of the art market also developed mostly in Holland in the 17th century. Dutch (northern Netherlandish) art focused on specific types of mostly secular subject matter, such as group portraits, domestic interiors, landscapes, still lifes, etc. - The Netherlands (both the north and the south) had belonged ever since 1477 to the Habsburg Empire, ruled from Austria. The Habsburg leadership was firmly committed to Catholicism and would not allow their subjects in the northern Netherlands to follow the path of Protestantism (both Lutheranism and an even stricter, native Dutch form, called Calvinism). This conflict plunged the Netherlands into a military conflict, which lasted for eighty years and culminated in the European-wide Thirty Years' War, 1618-1648. The Habsburgs sent in Spanish troops to fight this battle for them, as Spain was a loyal part of their empire. The Thirty Years' War was deeply destructive and ravaged cities and countryside in France, German speaking countries, Holland, Flanders, Scandinavia, and many other places. It was finally concluded in 1648 with the Habsburg Empire recognizing the independence of the Dutch Republic (the northern Netherlands), ruled by the citizens who started the uprising. Over the subsequent years, the Dutch Republic prospered economically because of overseas trade, extending to as far away as Indonesia and China. The situation provided the condition for the rise of a well-to-do middle class, some members of which began to collect art and invest some of their wealth in paintings and prints. This time period of peace and economic expansion gave rise to the "Golden Age" of Dutch art in the 17th century. It was defined by a great number of highly skilled painters, often also called "little masters" because many of them, despite their talent, remain know only to specialists of this period.

Dutch Baroque Landscapes: Cuyp and Van Ruisdael

- "A Distant View of Dordrecht, with a Milkmaid and Four Cows and Other Figures (The 'Large Dort')": Another Dutch specialty (in terms of subject matter) is landscape painting. The Netherlands is a flat country, without mountains, and partly below sea level, but protected by levees. Windmills, pastures, and dairy farming (cheese production) define the landscape to the present day. Cuyp was best known for his landscapes and painting of cows, the unofficial Dutch national animal, in an idealized setting. The milkmaid's work is certainly beautified, yet this is not an arcadian or classical landscape of the type we saw before. In the background we see the real city of Dordrecht. - "View of Haarlem from the Dunes at Overveen": Another Dutch "landscape specialist" was Jacob van Ruisdael. In this view of Haarlem, we see the typical low horizon lines, wide skies, and big cloud formations the define the countryside of the Low Countries. Ruisdael stressed the aspect of domestic wellbeing. Linen is being bleached in the sun, the church in the distance alludes to a God-fearing life (religious overtones can be expressed implicitly, for example, through landscape painting in the Protestant tradition), and windmills dot the bucolic scenery.

Proto-Renaissance

- "Renaissance" is a French word used in English, the literal meaning of which is "rebirth." In Italian the expression is renascence. Hence, the term "rinascita dell'antichità" is Italian for "rebirth of antiquity," and describes the driving influences of classical antiquity, or the culture and civilization of ancient Greece and Rome - starts in c. 1400, but the Proto-Renaissance describes art of the previous two centuries that anticipates the coming of the Renaissance - timeline (in folder) illustrates the development of Western art from classical antiquity to the "Medio Evo" or "medieval" period, and then the return to classical art as inspiration during the Renaissance beginning around 1400 - Italy in the thirteenth and fourteenth-centuries was made up of independent city states including Florence, Siena, Venice - idea of civic pride ran strong in each city state and was expressed through art - Many of the city states saw increasing prosperity because commerce with the Middle and Far East and because of a trade surplus with northern Europe (wool export) - These city states also became centers of "Humanist" learning, which favored the literature, world view, and culture of Classical Antiquity, disparaged during the Middle Ages which stigmatized the classical past as "pagan" - Roman Empire was divided into a Western (Italy) and Eastern (Byzantine) half. Refugee artists from the so-called "Iconoclastic controversy" in the East introduced the "maniera greca" style to the West. It is also called the Italo-Byzantine Style. This maniera greca style is typified by a flat, gold background, heavy use of line, and somewhat unnatural representation of figures and space - "Madonna Enthroned with Angels and Prophets": a flat, gilded space, sense of three-dimensional illusionism implied in the depiction of the throne, naturalism and realistic depictions of form and space would come to define the art of the Proto-Renaissance

Dutch Baroque: Honthorst and Rembrandt

- "Supper Party": van Honthorst's picture below looks like a Last Supper, but it is in fact a tavern scene with drunk men and women having a party. The picture was intended to be an allegory of gluttony and hints at another sin, prostitution, embodied by the young girl and the old procuress in the background. The picture was intended to be deeply moralizing: a warning again excesses of any kind, such as gluttony. With its peasant types and uncouth behavior, this picture exemplifies genre (lowlife) subjects. Such moralizing content was to the liking of the Dutch burghers. Van Honthorst, who was from the Dutch town of Utrecht, nevertheless used the Caravaggesque convention of a light source outside the picture. - "Archers of Saint Hadrian": Dutch artists pursued specializations by subject matter. The specialty of Frans Hals, based in the town of Haarlem, were group portraits, often depicting confraternal organizations, guilds, or civic militia groups. Civic militia groups, such as the archers of St. Hadrian, were involved in Holland's struggle for independence of the Habsburg Empire. All the archers are individualized; they are soldiers and citizens. They were dressed in black, prescribed by Protestant sumptuary laws, but wore sashes in Orange. Orange is the national color of the Netherlands. - "Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp": greatest artist of the Dutch "Golden Age" was Rembrandt. Here he is showing us the members of the Surgeon's Guild in Amsterdam, as they are dissecting a corpse. The idea of dissecting bodies for medical study was a relatively new one. The Catholic Church was opposed to dissections. However, dissections allowed for a better understanding of disease and the cause of death, leading to improvements in health science and ultimately to people living longer lives. Rembrandt's group portrait therefore attests to the rational, scientific mind set prevalent in the northern Netherlands, which seems to anticipate themes from the Enlightenment (=age of reason) of the 18th century. - "The Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq (Night Watch)": Rembrandt's largest and most important painting is the Night Watch. The Night Watch is a title of convenience; the full title is The Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq. The painting is a typical example of the nocturns, or night scenes, for which Rembrandt is most famous. Iconographically, it is another group portrait of a civic guard group during the Thirty Years' War. The party is about to come out to a city gate to greet a dignitary entering their city. All sitters are individualized; they strike a variety of poses, show off a variety of uniforms and arms. This painting was executed for a public setting. It was one of a series of six canvases commissioned in 1640 for the assembly and banquet hall of the Kloveniersdoelen (Musketeers' Hall) in Amsterdam, where such civic militia groups would meet. - "Return of the Prodigal Son": religious subjects are rare in the northern Netherlandish, or Dutch, tradition. Rembrandt was the exception, but whenever he did engage biblical subject matter, he introduced Protestant overtones. Derived from the Old Testament, the Prodigal Son story recounts a family drama, in which a son requests his inheritance, squanders it, and is forgiven by the father, much to the disapproval of his brothers. Rembrandt was the first artist to take into consideration that the story took place roughly 2,000 years earlier in the Middle East and not in contemporary Holland. In this sense, his approach can be compared to that of Martin Luther when he translated the bible into vernacular German and launched himself into a linguistic, historical, and cultural research to do so. Rembrandt carefully avoided the depiction of Madonnas, halos, saints, etc., which were associated with the Catholic tradition. At the same time, his painting bags for the empathy of the viewer: the old father welcomes back the "lost son" with a warm embrace as a symbol for forgiveness, while the brothers keep a cold distance. - "Rembrandt van Rijn, Self-Portrait": about Rembrandt's passion for painting his own portrait many times over the course of his life. This is an example from the end of his life. He is an old man holding his brushes and palette, but he still brags about his being able to draw perfect full-hand circles, like the ones in the background. Otherwise the earlier vanity is gone: his wife, sons had died, and he had to declare personal bankruptcy. - "Christ with the Sick around Him, Receiving the Children (Hundred Guilder Print)": Rembrandt understood the importance of disseminating his images to a larger audience. The best way to do so was through prints, which can be more easily transported than paintings, are less expensive, and can be reproduced in large numbers. Rembrandt's production of prints is sizable. Moreover, his plates do not reproduce paintings (as it was often the case prior to photography), but are original compositions. Since Rembrandt was a painter and a draftsman, he much preferred etchings over engravings; engraving was seen as a more commercial process, whereas etchings are more "artistic." Rembrandt's most famous etching is the Hundred Guilder Print. Guilders were the Dutch currency. One hundred guilders was ten gold coins, the going rate for good impressions from this plate. Prints were in high demand and precious during the 17th century. The official title is Christ with the Sick around Him, Receiving the Children. The plate thus shows Christ performing miracles, including healing scenes. Many details, aesthetic and iconographic, point to a Protestant interpretation of the scriptures. - "Three Crosses": Rembrandt obsessively reworked his plates over many years. In this way, it is possible to blot out figures, introduce new figures and alter the composition, all based on the original plate. Compare these two "states" of impressions obtained from the same copper plate and identify some of the figures that appear and disappear. It is still the same plate of the Three Crosses that was used for printing. Inevitably, however, the composition becomes darker in the process of reworking it and so did the artist's mood as a consequence of the setbacks in his life

Dutch Baroque Interiors and Still-Life: Vermeer, Dou, Brouwer, Claez, and Kalf

- "The Letter": depiction of domestic wellbeing is also a central concern in the art of Jan Vermeer. Although he is seen today as a major painter of the Dutch "Golden Age," he was "forgotten" for a long time and was "rediscovered" in the 19th century. This property has often been interpreted as evidence for the use of a camera obscura, a primitive viewing device that can serve as an aid for draftsmen. A camera obscura relies on the phenomenon described by physics: if one takes a hermetically sealed box, pierced by a whole on side, one can observe an upside-down projection of the box's exterior. A camera lucida takes this idea one step further: a mirror inside the box deflects the projected image upwards onto a ground piece of glass, on which tracing paper is placed to record the image. In this example, we see a typical Dutch interior of the 17th century with a tiled floor, paintings on the wall, and curtains. A young woman is playing a lute and receives a letter from a maid. All of Vermeer's paintings are small to fit into the type of interior depicted here. Such small pictures are also called cabinet pictures. - "Allegory of the Art of Painting": Vermeer's art shows the material wealth of middle-class interiors. The spectator is almost an intruder in this domestic harmony. This painting is believed to be an allegorical self-portrait of Vermeer, who depicted himself in the act of painting a picture. He is accompanied by Clio, the muse of history, with her trumpet. In the background, there is large map of the Dutch Republic; the drawn curtains serve as a spatial divide to the spectator. We see the same "soft focus" typical for Vermeer. - "Astronomer by Candlelight": Another master of small-scale, minutely rendered cabinet pictures was Gerrit Dou, a student of Rembrandt. His fortunes were the opposite of Vermeer's: he was celebrated during the 18th and 19th centuries but was later mostly forgotten. Although a typical representative of Dutch genre painting, Dou often shows the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake. This idea is embodied here by the astronomer, who tries to uncover the forces of the universe in his study, alone and in the middle of the night. The semi-circular upper half of the frame is a hallmark of Dou's art. - "The Dropsical Woman": another example of a "medical subject" in Dutch art. Dropsy is an archaic medical term that refers to the swelling of soft tissues due to the accumulation of excess water (edema due to a congestive heart condition). The doctor to the right is examining the urine of the patient, the seated elderly women. The scientific, rational aspect of the quest for finding a cure makes the subject distinctly modern. The setting is a richly decorated, Dutch interior with roundel windows. Dou's pictures were considered the most expensive and desirable artworks at the time and attest today to the circumstance that taste and the appreciation of art is always subject to change across the ages. - "The Smokers": range of genre subjects can be very extensive. The Smokers is a quintessential example of a genre scene. Brouwer shows us the interior of a tavern at night, filled with smokers, revelers, drunkenness, rude behavior, and ugly sitters. Brouwer was a "specialist" of such tavern scenes. - "Vanitas Still Life": innovation of subject matter in Netherlandish art pertained to still lifes. Pieter Claesz specialized in this type of painting. Among the musical instruments and fineries, we find a skull, that is a "memento mori" or a reminder of death. The message is moralizing and typically Baroque and Protestant: all wealth is temporal, as life is fleeting. - "Still Life with a Late Ming Ginger Jar": Kalf takes still life painting in a different direction. The painter had superb skills in rendering luxury goods, such as the goblet, silver tray, and the peeled lemon and orange in this example. Not only the porcelain ginger pot from China and the Oriental carpet from the Middle East, but also the fruit in the foreground are imported luxury goods from far away countries. They attest to Dutch overseas trade and colonial expansion. Kalf is also in a class by himself when it comes to the rendering of reflections on surfaces, such as on the goblet, which are very difficult to attain

Early Renaissance Painting: Castagno, Perugino, Mantagna, and Signorelli

- Another Florentine painter, Andrea del Castagno, also experimented with the depiction of illusionistic, three-dimensional space, using perspective - "Castagno's Last Supper": commissioned for the Refectory (dining hall) of the monastery of Sant'Apollonia, the figures are contained in an architectural niche rendered with nearly accurate one-point perspective; depiction of the figures themselves also shows a new development in Renaissance art — the psychological introspection of drama, as each of the disciples reacts to Christ's revelation of his impending betrayal with an individualized expression; psychological dimension is yet another aspect of the humanistic mindset of the Renaissance period; colorful, imitation marble panels and patterned tiles defining the background, which were inspired by Classical Antiquity, this fresco is another instance of a Biblical scene taken as a pretext to show the splendor and wealth of Florentine society. Also note the Near Eastern chimera, which appear as armrests flanking the ends of the benches - "Perugino's fresco of Christ Delivering the Keys of the Kingdom to Saint Peter": use of single-point perspective in early Renaissance painting; founding myth of the Vatican, in which Christ gives Peter the keys of the Vatican (a symbolic gesture highlighting Peter's responsibility for founding the Christian church); accurate single-point perspective to depict the city square in the foreground, and includes triumphal arches inspired by the Roman Arch of Constantine; commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV, who had begun a beautification program for the Vatican between 1481-1483, in which he enlisted Renaissance artists like Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, and Luca Signorelli to work on the Sistine chapel; Andrea Mantegna was an early Renaissance artist who experimented with the use of extreme foreshortening of the human body to achieve illusionistic three-dimensionality; fresco decoration of which was commissioned by the ruler of the independent Northern Italian city state of Mantua, Ludivico Gonzaga, for his wedding; depict scenes from Mantuan court life with a group of courtiers, including the artist himself, the duke's family, children, etc.; almost 9 years to complete; employs extreme illusionism in these frescoes as the figures seem to step out of wall. The precedent for this composition was the Roman wall paintings of Pompeii. The ceiling of the room represents the pinnacle of refinement with the Illusionistic "oculus" or "eye into the sky," in which we see foreshortened cherubs and peacocks beneath a blue sky. The artist employed the "di sotto in sù" (Italian meaning "seen from below") effect, which was accomplished through the foreshortening of cherubs, depicting their lower extremities larger since they would appear closer to the viewer in real life. - Mantagna's most radical experiment in foreshortening yet is seen in his painting of the "Dead Christ": bravado at foreshortening the body to create the illusion that the viewer was staring directly at the feet of Christ seem to take precedence over the message of redemption embodied by the figure of Christ - Florence experienced a change of intellectual climate. A Dominican monk, Girolama Savonarola, publicly condemned the hedonism of the Renaissance as "heretic," and demanded a return to Christian values. Savonarola managed to oust the Medici under Piero de' Medici. This event meant that Renaissance artists lost some of their most important patrons (the Medicis). Overall, there was a change in mood across Italy, putting more of an emphasis on the ideas of sin and repentance, which were communicated through art - "Luca Signorelli's, Damned Cast into Hell": fresco is a possible example of Savonarola's effect on art; we see a drastic vision of the damned (sinners) as they are punished in hell. The Iconography is very medieval in spirit with its inclusion of demons and tortured souls. However, the body types and their depiction in the nude still shows the influence of Classical Antiquity and the Renaissance in their naturalistic rendering of musculature and anatomy.

Baroque Architecture in Italy

- Architecture, too, was drafted into the purpose of affirming the leadership role of the Roman Catholic Church in the world. To this end, grandiosity, spectacular effects, drama and visual propaganda went hand in hand. Among the architectural elements of the Baroque style, one can cite the following qualities: - undulating facades - oval or irregular plans (deviations from Renaissance central plans) - general preference for asymmetry - onset of the Baroque style in architecture is often associated with the pontificate of Pope Sixtus V (ruled 1585-1590) - Carlo Maderno eventually came to design the façade of St. Peter's (the Vatican) in Rome. However, he first came to the attention of Sixtus V when he built the church of Santa Susanna at the turn of the 17th century. At first glance, the façade may not strike one as special with its many classical features. Nevertheless, it marks a shift towards novelty embodied by the Baroque style. The importance of symmetry in Renaissance architecture is lost and decorative elements take over. We find a multiplication of niches with sculptures, columns, dramatic recesses, and scroll buttresses, all of which are Baroque qualities. Water and fountains, such as in the (much later) 18th-century Trevi fountain in Rome, can also be part of this architectural recipe - Maderno modeled his façade after that of Gicomo della Porta's church of Il Gesu in Rome (built 1575-1584), which was conceived as a prototype for the churches the Jesuit order built all around the world. The Jesuits were at the peak of their power and influence during the 17th century. They were strongly engaged in education (especially of the elites) and in missionary work in the Americas. Mission architecture in Texas, California, but also in South America, has its origins in the church of Il Gesu in Rome, which Maderno updated. - Maderno thus came to design the façade of the "Vatican" in Rome in the Baroque style. It was the finishing touch in completing new St. Peter's. The façade essentially copies that of St. Susanna and blows it out of proportions. At its core, we still find a classical temple façade, but one adorned with niches, recesses, and classical statuary on the balustrade of the roof, against the backdrop of a giant dome. (The bell towers, to the left and to the right, were added later.) Maderno thus completed the job that was begun with the central plan by Bramante and continued with the simplified plan by Michelangelo. Maderno abandoned the central plan and the symmetry of the previous designs. He created depth by adding three nave bays to the previous structure, which contributed even more to the irregularity that is typical for the Baroque. The plaza in front of St. Peter's, however, was the work of Bernini. - The "piazza of St. Peter's" is surrounded by double-colonnade of simple Tuscan columns. It combines a trapezoid with an oval shape. Both are irregular shapes, as opposed to a perfectly regular circle or square, for example. The idea behind Bernini's design was that of an embracing gesture towards the pilgrims who would come to Rome to see the Vatican. Renaissance regularity was therefore abandoned for theatricality and spectacle. In the center of the design, we find an obelisk imported from Egypt. - Borromini is another Baroque architect in Rome who took the Baroque style to an extreme. He built a small church at a busy intersection in the city, marked by fountains in its four corners, hence the name St. Charles at the Four Fountains (San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane). The church was built on an irregular plot of land, which only partly accounts for its eccentricities. The two façades are encrusted with sculptures, niches, columns, and recesses. A central theme is the oval. There are multiple ovals inherent in the façade design, including one that breaks up the classical pediment. The interior of the church is small, but many details of its plan echo the shape of an oval. Even the original Greek cross plan is forced into an oval and there are multiple oval domes, one grafted on another. Despite its small size, San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane is the culmination point of the Baroque style in architecture in Rome.

Early Renaissance and Humanism

- Art is also a reflection in the changes in mentalities - During the Middle Ages, the accumulation of riches in the beyond to avoid the hardship of purgatory and hell fostered an anti-materialist attitude - This changed with the Renaissance, which celebrated classical texts, worldly accomplishments, and the enjoyment of finer things in life. - there was a renewed interest in the "pagan" authors of Classical Antiquity, such as Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, and Ovid, whose teachings were not always approved by the Christian Church - saw the invention of the printing press and movable type by Johannes Gutenberg in 1445, which allowed for the easier spread of ideas across Europe - "Dante's Divine Comedy": published in the local vernacular, instead of in Latin. The humanistic mindset also promoted an investment in the "here and now" by espousing civic pride and responsibility to one's city, as well as fame, honor, worldly accomplishments and accumulation of wealth - New art patrons in the form of wealthy merchants and individuals engaged in "condotte" (mercenaries) allowed for the arts to flourish outside of the patronage of the Church. - most influential and "model" patrons were the Medici family of Florence, who had acquired great wealth through banking, and who made Florence the art center of Italy through their patronage

Giotto, Duccio, Martini, and Lorenzetti

- Considered the "grandfather" of the Renaissance for his more naturalistic style and humanistic representation of human forms, Giotto is the quintessential Proto-Renaissance artist - trained by Cimabue, so he still retains components of the Italo-Byzantine style, but we see an even better sense of three-dimensional space in the depiction of the throne upon which the Madonna sits. We also see a naturalistic rendering of physiognomy and use of realistic flesh tones - "interior decoration of the Arena Chapel in Padua": represents the culmination of Giotto's advancements in both naturalism and humanist themes; decorated in true fresco, meaning it was painted while the plaster was still wet; a revolutionary step forward in realism, as Italo-Byzantine artists depicted the sky in gold, in anticipation of the riches in the beyond, attained after death in exchange for a virtuous life. Giotto's frescos are comprised of 38 framed picture panels featuring an iconography of episodes from the life of Mary and Christ. Between the panels, we also see imitation marble veneer, which is a technique copied from ancient Rome monuments. - "Giotto's Lamentation panel from the Arena Chapel": shift away from Italo-Byzantine style towards more naturalism in the individualized facial expressions of the figures and in the asymmetrical composition; the Florentine painter and writer Giorgio Vasari, stated that "Giotto was born to throw light on the art of painting." - "Siena": one of the Italian city-states, like Florence or Venice, and became wealthy because of silk trade. Art became an expression of civic pride, so the arts flourished in Siena during the Proto-Renaissance. According to Vasari (who was biased towards Florence), Siena was a stronghold of artistic traditionalism, as we still see the influence of the Italo-Byzantine style. - "Palazzo Pubblico": spatial expression for building a community of citizens around a central, civic monument. Similar squares, including the central bell tower, defined many other Renaissance cities as well. The Bell Tower on the LSU campus was conceived in imitation of a campanile (or tower), such as the one which defines Siena's Palazzo Pubblico - "Maestà altarpiece": Duccio was a key Sienese artist of the proto-Renaissance, exemplifies the conservative Sienese style that was still heavily rooted in the Italo-Byzantine tradition - "Virgin and Child Enthroned with Saints": iconography consists of the seated Madonna (Virgin Mary) surrounded by saints; altarpiece was a religious monument with civic overtones; less naturalistic rendering than in Giotto's panels for the Arena Chapel, as the saints seem to be crammed into a small space. The flat, gold background is indicative of the Italo-Byzantine tradition, but we do see some attempts at realistically representing three-dimensional space - "Betrayal of Jesus": medieval stiffness of the main panel is relaxed, emotions are expressed, the landscape with the trees and rocks is rendered naturalistically, and classical drapery (inspired by Greek and Roman art) is reintroduced. Still, the gold background with tooling of Italo-Byzantine tradition persists - "Simone Martini": iconography of this Annunciation scene features the angel Gabriel who is announcing to the Virgin the birth of Christ. Other symbolic references are implied by the white lilies, which are indicative of the Virgin's purity and virginity; the side panels feature Saint Ansanus and Saint Margaret; Martini was a pupil of Duccio in Sienna; go on to work for the French Kings in Naples and Sicily, where he came in contact with French art. We can see that he absorbed influences from the French Gothic (medieval) style, evident in the Gothic tracery patterns of the frame, the use of brilliant colors, the lavish costumes, and the intricate ornaments. This combination of his Italo-Byzantine roots in Siena with French influences is referred to as the "international style" of the proto-Renaissance - "Effects of Good Government in the City and in the Country": fresco; llegorical representation of what values "good government" should promote, such as peace, prosperity, and a virtuous civic life. Commissioned by the city government, it is almost a work of propaganda that praises how good a job the leadership is doing to preserve peace, and hence to promoted prosperity for all citizens - "Peaceful Country": portion of fresco, scene communicates that good government has the same effects on the countryside as it has on the city. We see scenes depicting peace, trade, and prosperity. Both the embrace of secular themes and the shift towards an interest in depicting nature, as seen in the rolling hills of Tuscany, foreshadow to the impending Renaissance - these proto-Renaissance advancements in Siena would have no aftermath, as the Lorenzetti brothers are likely to have died during an outbreak of the plague (the "Black Death") 1348, which killed between 25-50% of Europe's population. This catastrophe was also a setback for the arts

Painting in Rome: Botticelli and da Vinci

- High Renaissance lasted only for about the first three decades of the 16th century. It was cut short by the sack of Rome by Protestant German Landsknechts (soldiers) in 1527, after which artistic and architectural activities came nearly to a halt. An artwork which anticipates the preoccupations of the High Renaissance was Sandro Botticelli's Birth of Venus, especially as far as the volumetric body type is concerned (see discussion of Michelangelo below) - Botticelli was one of many artists patronized by the Medici family in Florence (see also Donatello, above). The Medici made their fortunes in banking, but soon became power brokers in Florence and beyond; their political power was such that eventually popes would be selected from this family. Today the Medici name is synonymous with art patronage and the artistic excellence that the Medicis promoted. - "Sandro Botticelli's Birth of Venus": Sandro Botticelli was inspired to create the Birth of Venus by a poem by Humanist writer Angelo Poliziano, a contemporary of his, which mimicked verse and themes from Roman times. Venus, the classical goddess of love, arrives on her sacred island, Cyprus. The wind god Zephyrus is to her left, blowing her shell in the direction of the nymph Pomona, ready to receive her with an embroidered mantle. With its vaguely classical, pagan inspiration, the Birth of Venus is a typical product of the humanist culture of the Renaissance, which sought not only to reappreciate the classical past, but also to actively recreate it though art and literature; being created at the end of Quattrocento, the Birth of Venus anticipated artistic trends of the High Renaissance. For example, iconography was not exclusively concerned with religious themes any longer. Botticelli favored hedonistic subject, celebrating the enjoyment of the senses for its own sake. He often painted volumetric bodies and mythological characters, which became a prime focus of the Renaissance as classical Greek and Roman works were rediscovered. - "Virgin on the Rocks": Leonardo da Vinci (his name literally means "Leonardo from the town of Vinci") was a man of many talents. Skilled in military engineering, geography, anatomy, sculpture and painting, he trained in the sculptor Andrea del Verocchio's studio. By 1481, he was employed by the Duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza, who was primarily interested in his abilities as a military engineer, but Leonardo was nonetheless encouraged to also create art. In this context, he was commissioned the central panel of an altarpiece in the chapel of the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception in Milan, the Virgin on the Rocks. From a formalist perspective, the painting features a pyramidal composition. It is also a good example of the atmospheric perspective (misty, soft focus), a typical characteristic for Leonardo's work - returned to the subject of the Virgin on the Rocks, when he completed a large, related sketch in charcoal between 1505-1507. This sketch showed even more relaxed conventions than seen in the painting. The iconography of the Christ child playing with Infant St. John, the Virgin and St. Ann is obviously similar to that of the Virgin on the Rocks, but the emotional ties seem to run even stronger. As in the painting, Leonardo introduced atmospheric perspective - "Virgin and Child with Saint Anne and Infant St. John": We can think of him primarily as a very gifted draftsman. Most of his drawings are contained in the dozens of sketchbooks by him that have survived. The sketches are accompanied by texts, some written backwards or in secret ink; they reveal Leonardo to be not only a scientist and engineer, but also a mystic. The intellectual, scientific, and artistic interests of the sketchbooks are far-ranging, from stages in the pre-natal development of the human fetus to the development of flying machines anticipating airplanes, and to central-plan architectural plans for churches and cathedrals. These two illustrations are taken from pages of Da Vinci's manuscripts and highlight the range of his scientific interests. Leonardo da Vinci still speaks to 21st-century audiences so strongly in part because his mind set seems to anticipate the technology-driven civilization of our own age. - "Last Supper in Milan": One of Da Vinci's most famous works is the Last Supper in Milan. He created the mural for the refectory (dining hall) of the Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie; This notion is also reinforced by Da Vinci's emphasis on the Eucharist. The painting is constructed strictly around single-point perspective, with the vanishing point coinciding with Christ's head, and shows the moment Christ tells his disciples that one of them will betray him. The original fresco has deteriorated badly as a result of Leonardo's unfortunate experiments with art materials. The fresco visible today is more a work of successive restoration campaigns than of original substance - "Mona Lisa is Leonard's masterpiece": featuring an enigmatically smiling woman, who draws every year millions of visitors to the Louvre. The portrait was revealed by Giorgio Vasari, the first art historian, to depict a wealthy Florentine woman, Lisa di Antonio Maria Gherardini. The Mona Lisa is another example of Leonardo's use of atmospheric perspective, which is also referred to as sfumato, meaning smoky manner. The fame of the Mona Lisa has a lot to do with an event in the Louvre in 1911, when the painting was stolen and eventually recovered several months later. The theft became the first occasion when "art world news" made international headline

Baroque Painting in Spain

- In the 17th century Spain was part of the powerful Habsburg empire, which was ruled from Vienna, Austria, and also included the Netherlands. The Habsburg leadership was a strong supporter of Catholicism and the Vatican. Spain was not only deeply Catholic, but also a cultural and artistic backwater. This situation changed over the course of the 17th century, as some of the leading Baroque painters issued forth from Spain. - As his name implies, El Greco ("the Greek") was not a native Spaniard but came from the Greek island of Crete originally. He trained in Venice under the Mannerist painter Tintoretto and learned about the Mannerist style in Florence and Rome before settling in Spain. He was the first to introduce the innovations of the Italian later Renaissance to the country. - "The Burial of Count Orgaz": El Greco settled permanent in the Spanish town of Toledo in 1577, when he painted the The Burial of Count Orgaz. The composition follows a typical Baroque formula of separating the worldly and heavenly realm into two levels, or registers. The work has a visionary and mysterious quality. There are strong black-and-white contrasts and swirling clouds. The figures are unnaturally elongated, as in Mannerist art. Such works were conceived to stir religious fervor in the believer, a typical feature of the Counter-Reformation. - "Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew": Another characteristic of the Baroque style and the art of the Counter-Reformation is the foregrounding of saints and their suffering. José de Ribera' Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew is a good example. He is depicted as a plebeian figure that is not idealized: old, bearded, emaciated. It can be compared to the bulky, peasant figures of Caravaggio and attests to Caravaggio's influence even in Spain - "Saint Serapion": painting of the martyrdom of Saint Serapion served a similar purpose. It was painted for the monastic Order of Mercy as a devotional image in a funerary chapel. Serapion lived during the Middle Ages, when he participated in the 3rd Crusade in 1196, during which he was captured while preaching the Gospel to Muslims. Before being decapitated, he was brutally tortured. Again, the suffering of the saint is emphasized; dark tonalities and black-and-white contrasts prevail. There are hints of a tree in the background, but otherwise the saint's white linen cloth stands out starkly against the black background. - "Water Carrier of Seville": Diego Velázquez was undoubtedly the most famous Spanish Baroque painter. He was the court painter to king Philip IV of Spain and enjoyed the king's personal confidence. He made one trip to Italy, but otherwise stayed in Madrid and attended to his duties as a court painter. The Water Carrier of Seville is a genre or lowlife scene. Spain is a hot country and there was no running water at the time; the water supply was assured by itinerant water sellers like this one, who is handing a glass goblet of fresh water to a boy. The water carrier is a rugged, old, and unsophisticated figure dressed in torn clothing. He is a man of the people and a bulky figure of the type Caravaggio could have painted. Brownish tonalities prevail. - "Las Meninas (The Maids of Honor)": Velázquez's most famous work is Las Meninas or The Maids of Honor. It is a scene from court life in Madrid. We see, on the right, the Infanta, or Princess, Margarita, with her maids-in-waiting (playmates), a dwarf (court jester, for court entertainment), and dogs. The most intuitive interpretation is this: the Infanta watches on as her parents, the king and the queen, are being painted by Velázquez, whom we see in a dark dress with a red cross of the Order of Santiago emblazoned on his chest behind a giant canvas (on the left)/ However, we cannot see the subject which Velázquez is painting, but we can infer from the context that it is the portrait of the king and the queen on which he works. An alternative reading may be that he is working on the very same canvas we are currently beholding. Similarly, the picture puts the beholder implicitly in the role of the king and the queen. Understood in this sense, the picture can be interpreted as an interesting document for the formation of modern self-consciousness. The exchange of gazes of the Infanta, her retinue, the king and queen, the painter and us is one of the moments, according to sociologist Michel Foucault, when the modern subject recognizes his or her human essence.

Mannerist

- Mannerism, which is synonymous with the Late Renaissance period, celebrates qualities such as artificiality and distorted forms, and is furthermore defined by the following characteristics: - style of excess and exaggeration - Renaissance order, symmetry, proportions abandoned - elongated figures (figura serpentinata) - vertical orientation - ambiguous space - hyper-sophistication and decadence - "Descent from the Cross": painting by Jacopo da Pontormo has no central focus, rendering the space ambiguous. (Previously, artists invested a great amount of effort into creating clearly defined spatial settings through the use of perspective.) As is typical for Mannerism, the figures are elongated and flaccid (seem to be spineless), particularly that of Christ. They twist in space as if they were weightless, which is typical for Mannerism. Pontormo used pastel colors to render the figures' billowing cloth, which helped to create the sensation of the figures being suspended in the air. - "Madonna with the Long Neck": featuring the elongated bodies of Jesus and Mary twisting in space, is the epitome of the Mannerist style. The body parts seem to have a lost all proportional relationship with each other: the Madonna's neck is too long, the Christ child's head is too big, and his extremities are too long. The body of the Virgin is elongated and twisted, forming a Figura serpentinata, or "serpentine figure." The setting is imbued with a decadent air of luxuriousness, as expressed through props like curtains, an amphora vase, and a cushion for the Virgin's throne. The child attendants bringing the amphora are Parmigianino's invention to enhance the eccentric and decadent aspect of the composition. The free-standing white column of the background alludes to medieval sources, which often compared Mary's allegedly long neck to a great ivory tower or column. The oddness of the small, emaciated figure of St. Jerome unfurling a scroll (lower right) inspired the Surrealist visions of Spanish painter Salvador Dalí in the 1930s - "Venus, Cupid, Folly, and Time": Bronzino was a student of Pontormo, who worked as a painter to Cosimo I, Duke of Tuscany. Time, portrayed as a bearded man, pulls back the curtain to reveal Cupid fondling his mother Venus, as Folly advances to shower them with roses. The masks on the ground, to the right, allude to theatricality and deceit. We have to imagine the scene to represent a stage set. The central theme is hedonism, or enjoyment of the senses for its own sake and without remorse. The porcelain-like whiteness of bodies, in addition to a prevalence of rose colors, convey the Mannerist quality artificioso: anything that is artificial or contrived. - Mannerist style also exists in architecture, although the number of examples is much more limited. Giulio Romano was an architect and painter who worked for the court of Mantua, in the north of Italy, and the local rule, Duke Frederigo Gonzaga. The duke asked Romano to remodel his stables into a pleasure palace. We are looking at a view of the interior courtyard. Romano played with the design conventions of Greek and Roman architecture. The structure is full of surprises. We find heavily rusticated blocks of masonry (which are excessively rusticated even) and a disruption of the regularity, geometry and measure that defined the High Renaissance. Romano introduced sliding triglyphs, which appear to be crushing on the passerby, and protruding key stones, which further enhance the impression of a palace perpetually on the verge of collapse. Of course, these details were conceived to be humorous and ironical - "Palazzo del Tè (interior courtyard)": Inside the Palazzo del Tè, Romano painted a giant illusionistic fresco showing heaven collapsing, while giants vainly hold up the columns supporting the canopy of clouds and figures. Heaven is populated with figures that are about to tumble down. The illusionism of the ceiling is best observed from the central spot marked by the terrazzo floor. The impression of the architecture on the exterior, that of a palace forever collapsing, is therefore perpetuated in the interior with the "Fall of the Giants" fresco - "Christ in the House of Levi": Paolo Veronese loved to paint on monumental scale, as evidenced by this 18-foot-long masterwork. Veronese is the primary representative of Mannerism in Venetian painting. The composition was originally planned as a Last Supper scene. However, the setting raises some eyebrows. Veronese's Last Supper takes place in the splendid loggia of an upper-class palazzo of the type that the Venetian gilded oligarchy owned. It is bustling with well-dressed guests, attendants, dogs and even dwarfs (court jesters). Surely, this is not how the bible described the Last Supper. The Inquisition of the Catholic Church intervened and requested that Veonese repaint the picture. But artists had learned to become independent-minded by this point. The only concession Veronese made to the Church's policing body was to change the title to Christ in the House of Levi - "Triumph of Venice": Veronese enjoyed a great reputation in Venice and was eventually appointed the official painter to the Venetian republic. Civic virtue ran high in Venice, often higher than religious feelings. These sentiments were expressed in terms of art and architecture, for which the Triumph of Venice is an excellent example. In 1547, there was a fire in the Doge's Palace, after which Veronese was asked to replace the lost decorations of the Grand Council Hall. In the center of the artistic program of this large room, which functioned almost like a club for the ruling families in the city, Veronese placed the female personification of Venice crowned and born aloft in the clouds. She is framed by fantasy architecture, twisted columns, military heroes, the Venetian upper-class, attendants of a sumptuous party on a balcony and the lion of St. Mark, Venice's patron saint. The excessiveness of visual content qualifies the Triumph of Venice as a product of Mannerism.

Painting in Rome: Michelangelo, and Raphael

- Michelangelo was a sculptor by training. We will look at his work from three perspectives: painting, architecture, and sculpture - "his most iconic undertaking was the Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel": volumetric, muscular body type that pervades the ceiling is often explained with Michelangelo's background in sculpture. The Sistine Chapel is of central importance for the life of the Vatican because it is here that new popes are elected by a conclave of cardinals; were multiple challenges Michelangelo faced in the fresco's creation, including its size (5,800 square feet), the curvature of the ceiling, and the distance to the floor (70 feet). The artist had to work from close-up on a scaffold directly under ceiling, but the effect needed to look just right from 70 feet below. How to maintain visual illusionism? Michelangelo transferred his design on large sheets of paper, where the outlines of the figures were perforated, then the sheets were taken up the scaffold and held up closely against the wall; then charcoal was applied along the perforated outlines, retracing the design directly onto the curving ceiling. The forms were then filled in with the actual painting in the next step; Sistine Chapel ceiling unfurls a complex iconographic program - "Last Judgment": Michelangelo began work on the Last Judgment about seven years after the Sack of Rome, in which the mutinous (and mostly Protestant) troops of Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, stormed, pillaged, and looted Rome. The Reformation in Germany was also well underway at this point, spearheaded by Martin Luther, who had posted his 95 Theses in Wittenberg in 1517; ulius II had financed his costly wars and the building of the new Vatican with the sale of "indulgences," or official letters from the Church granting forgiveness of sins. He also engaged in rampant nepotism, selling positions in the Church or giving his own family members high-ranking positions in the ecclesiastic hierarchy. These criticisms finally boiled over and a schism occurred, separating the Church into a Catholic and a Protestant (Lutheran) branch; schism of the Church eventually led to a Catholic counterstrike known as the Counter-Reformation. This movement began with the Council of Trent (1545-1563). The Council not only declared many Protestant positions heretical, but also agreed upon a bundle of measures to counter the challenge of the Protestants. Among the many countermeasures decided, some had particular relevance for art and architecture. Protestantism was also an iconoclastic movement; The Counter-Reformation, however, prescribed Catholic institutions the direct opposite: a super-abundance of decoration and ornate artworks. The Catholic Church understood that most of the population in Europe was illiterate, but could be reached through images, which conveyed the biblical message. This evolution gave rise in the 17th century to the Baroque style - altar wall fresco by Michelangelo displays a noticeable difference in the style and mood compared to ceiling, as Michelangelo tests a new type of visual rhetoric. In the center of the altar wall fresco; Thus, when Michelangelo returned after twenty years to the Sistine Chapel to complete his masterwork, he returned to a type of imagery typical for the Middle Ages. Of course, the artist himself had gotten older, but most importantly the mood had changed under the impression of the crises outlined above and this mood change is reflected in the iconography of the altar wall - "Philosophy": fresco is from the Stanza della Segnatura, the Room of the Signature in the papal library where diplomatic treatises were signed. The four walls of the Stanza della Segnatura are decorated with allegorical frescoes representing Theology, Law, Poetry and Philosophy. They were the work of Raphael and his students. Raphael is the third major artist of the High Renaissance, after Leonardo and Michelangelo. For a long period of time, Raphael, who is best known for Madonna and child images, was the uncontested "art star" of the 18th to the 19th century. But our own age has treated him less kindly because he is often seen as too saccharine (sweet or sentimental). He got demoted by the second half of the 20th century, which made the engineering-minded Leonardo come out ahead of him; Overall, the work is typical of the infatuation with Humanist culture based on classical models, which, by the early 16th century, reached even the Vatican - "Marriage of the Virgin": oil panel by Raphael is the epitome of High Renaissance style and shows how Raphael combined the influences of both Leonardo and Michelangelo in this art. The subject is based on a 13th-century collection of invented religious stories by Jacopo de Voragine, called The Golden Legend; The visual emphasis is on a vast plaza with tiling and a round classical temple structure in the background. The opening of the temple's door marks the vanishing point and all the tiles are constructed to converge on this point. Raphael's Marriage of the Virgin is a triumph of single-point perspective and classical architecture, especially so since the central, round temple is surrounded by a Roman arcade